Read the Year that Was: 2019

There’s a lot to be excited for as we kickoff the new decade.  

Inspiration is everything, and I look forward to continuing to work with and learn from dynamic colleagues across several networks that I am affiliated with. These include the Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy SOAS, Sport & Démocratie (join us in Paris 22 January 2020 for a global sport roundtable), International Cultural Relations, and RERIS. A special mention to those in the broader basketball, sports diplomacy, sports business, and sports media sectors who have helped inform, enrich, and make my ideas and work much stronger—and more enjoyable. Especially within the women’s football world. And an honorable mention to the original Dream Team.

I’m looking to 2020 as I continue to build out two key stories of my own. First, basketball diplomacy at large will take a front seat as the NBA continues to globalize. But I will also finish Basketball Empire, my book on the hidden story of the NBA’s globalization—how and why France has become a major pipeline for international NBA and WNBA players while also tackling the question of whose empire, exactly, my title teases out.

Moreover, I see 2020 as a break out year where many of the trends and movements we’ve seen emerge in the global sports sphere finally bear fruit. Primarily, for me, these are stories where cross-sport and cross-cultural influences—often influenced by different types of sports diplomacy—make all the difference. And, as my crystal ball indicates, sports diplomacy will continue to rise to the forefront in sports business and storytelling.  

1. NBA Paris Game.

The NBA has enjoyed success in France in ways unparalleled by the country’s domestic league, the Jeep Elite (former ProA). The 1992 U.S. Dream Team propelled the NBA to the forefront of global popular culture and influenced many of today’s French players. Thirty-five years after Michael Jordan first arrived on French shores, one of the game’s GOATs returns to Paris with his team, the Charlotte Hornets, for the first NBA regular season game to be contested in the hexagone. Lots more from me on this as we enter January, including how the NBA Paris game reflects the Franco-American relationship that helped globalize the game in Europe more than a century ago.

2. OL-FC Reign Partnership with Jean-Michel Aulas and Tony Parker.

More French-American sports diplomacy! The world’s most dominant professional club, Olympique Lyonnais Féminin, has purchased NWSL’s FC Reign with OL partner Tony Parker investing a 3% stake in this interesting incursion of a French football club into the U.S. professional soccer scene. Parker is president and a majority owner of ASVEL and LDLC ASVEL Féminin, professional men’s and women’s basketball teams in Lyon (Marie-Sophie Obama is the acting president of LDLC ASVEL Féminin and Nicolas Batum is its director of basketball operations). Yes, this is the same club where NY Liberty’s Marine Johannès is playing. I’ve previously written on the cross-sport influences between the NBA and global (men’s) football for The Athletic; with this new partnership, I’m keen to see the intersections and influences in the women’s football arena.

3. Basketball Africa League & FIFA’s Desire to tap Africa

Ever since the NBA and FIBA announced the launch of their joint Basketball Africa League last February, all eyes have turned to the African continent as the next frontier of development and business growth. I’m excited as the BAL begins its first playoff season this spring. But also was not surprised at all when FIFA President Gianni Infantino began to bandy around the idea of a FIFA-sponsored 20-team professional football league in Africa. More to come on the growth of professional African basketball and football, for sure, particularly within the context of sports diplomacy and ethics (ahhem, FIFA).

4. French Elite Athletes/National Teams at Euro2020, and the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

2020 is a big summer to demonstrate how the Making of Les Bleus has paid off into big 21-st century dividends. First the men’s football team will compete for supremacy at the Euro; will they be able to repeat the feat of the 1998 World Cup winners who clenched the following European Championship in 2000? Then, at the Tokyo Olympics I’ll be keeping tabs on Les Bleues of basketball, who are looking to improve on their 4th place Rio results, as well as Les Bleus on the hoops hardcourt as Nicolas Batum and company seek to turn their historic defeat of Team USA at the FIBA World Cup into a dream all of their own (and possibly gold?).

5. Handoff of the Summer Olympic Flame from Tokyo to Paris.

Yoohoo! When Tokyo closes on August 9, they will pass the Olympic torch to Paris, who will host the 2024 Summer Games. The last time Paris hosted, 1924, there were several innovations and I’m keen to see what else is brewing as the Games edge closer to a French return.

Wishing you the very best for a sparkling 2020 where the sky is the limit.